bitcoin

Trying to understand blockchain technology is a bit like trying to wrap your head around the subprime mortgage crisis: It may take more than a lifetime to fully grasp the concepts. In a nutshell, the blockchain is a distributed database—think a living, breathing spreadsheet operating in real-time—that audits itself every ten minutes and can’t be tampered with. An entire bitcoin network, for instance, relies on the blockchain as a shared public ledger. Every transaction of the cryptocurrency then is unalterably recorded.

Turns out this is the equivalent of digital provenance, so it’s very important to art. We talked to ascribe, a company that is using Blockchain technology for art authentication and contracts.

While in Berlin, we had the chance to speak with their creative team—including co-founders Trent and Masha McConaghy—to get a better sense as to what exactly ascribe offers to artists, and delve further into how it plans to specifically address the ongoing issues around the ownership, loaning and consigning of digital art.

Artist Wim Delvoye’s career includes an array of materials: pig carcasses, fecal matter, and, as of 2014, a yoga mat. [Art Markit]

The Venice Biennale won’t open until May 9, but we already know who’s set to receive the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement: Ghanaian artist El Anatsui, born in 1944. [ARTnews]

45 percent of men think it’s harder to be a man today than in their father’s generation. [Think Tank]

Why is that? “The Shriver Report,” from which Think Tank culled that statistic, contains responses indicating that it’s because of attaining a stronger position in the workplace, a stronger position financially, and greater gender equality. [A Woman’s Nation]

Protests continue at the National Gallery in London over the museum’s choice to outsource jobs to a private company; the decision would affect more than 400 current employees. [The Art Newspaper]

Brought to our attention via the Internet pipelines, a 2011 review of Open Engagement: “Is there a significant difference between what this street preacher is doing and what socially engaged artists do?” The more things change…maybe they don’t change—see our 2015 review of Open Engagement. [Portland Art]

“[C]apitalism constitutes the horizon of possibility for artists and manufacturers alike, and must be reckoned with as such. The question then becomes: how far can artistic reflexivity go before becoming complicit with the economy it seeks to critique?” [DIS Magazine]

Chinese auction houses hope to bring in more local buyers through sales of Impressionist and Modern art. [South China Morning Post]

Dear Artforum Editors: Can you please explain what this means in your 50 Shades ofGrey review? “James’s own voice and writing tics…suggest nothing so much as a non-lubed and nonconsensual fist fuck of the English language.” [Artforum]

Miss P, a 15-inch beagle from Canada, won best in show at the Westminster Kennel Club Show. [The New York Times]

The Soap Factory, one of the largest non-profit spaces in Minneapolis, has been selected to create a work at this year’s Art Basel, in conjunction with Kickstarter and the Walker Art Center. That’s a quartet of names I never expected to hear mentioned together. [The Soap Factory]

I’m always amazed by the number of animals who donate works of art to auction every year. Seriously, Jett the Dolphin, Azy the orangutan, and Tomby the elephant all donated finger-paintings to benefit the Riley Hospital for Children at Indiana University. [Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis]

“My work isn’t your clip art dude.” First part of this story: Mega-famous DJ Diplo used artist Rebecca Mock’s GIF without properly attributing the work to her. Then, second part: sexism ensues! [Dazed via Canvas]

Not another article that claims, in 2015, that museums and galleries are finally “starting to take digital art seriously”! [Dezeen]

Bitcoin may not replace dollars as soon as we thought (according to people who write about money). A study by Goldman voices its doubts about the stability of a currency that’s not backed by any standard other than comparison with other currencies. Says professor Eric Posner, whom Goldman interviewed: “The people who maintain the Bitcoin network can change the money supply through a majoritarian process. And that means that the supply of bitcoin is a function of what the majority of these people think at any given time.” [Business Insider]

The new TEFAF art market report is out, and according to Alexander Forbes’ summary on artnet news, it spells good news for the continued health of physical and online galleries. Fairs, he says, have lost a little steam as exhibitor costs are becoming too expensive. [Artnet News]

Bitcoin has sparked an alternative-currency revolution. The Lakota Nation tribe in South Dakota has adopted MazaCoin as the tribe’s official currency. [Al Jazeera America]

The Armory Show is so full of our contemporary art, reports Sarah Douglas for Gallerist, that the ones that get noticed tend to be the older ones. For instance, Sean Kelly Gallery brought a reproduction of Marcel Duchamp’s “L.H.O.O.Q.” to the Armory Show. [Gallerist]

The Basquiat Estate has filed a complaint regarding the authenticity of works presented at a Christie’s auction this week. [Hyperallergic]

Benjamin Sutton rounds up the humorous work at The Armory, most which, can be found in the “Focus” section of the fair. This year, the section casts its sights on China. Our favorite work highlighted is Andrew Ohanesian’s, Dollar Bill Acceptor (2014). Gimme one of these. [Artnet]

“Over the years, the New York Times has introduced the world to many dubious trends,” writes Margaret Hartmann for New York Magazine. Today, the Times claims that monocles are trending all over the world. [Daily Intelligencer]

New York City has just given the Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum $5 million towards its $79 million renovation. [ArtsBeat]

Former Executive Director of Rhizome and New Museum triennial co-curator Lauren Cornell interviews Laura Poitras, the filmmaker behind The Guardian interview in which Edward Snowden revealed himself to the public. Poitras, who was described as the “Keyser Soze of the [Snowden] story” by The New York Times earlier this year, expresses her commitment to fighting against the “Orwellian nightmare” of government surveillance. She also uses the interview to speak about storytelling and the artistic choice to put Snowden behind the camera. Poitiers is currently making a documentary about government surveillance in America which will serve as the finale in a trilogy of films about the post-9/11 world. [Mousse Magazine]

The Silk Road, a website operated via Bitcoin exchange and subject of various artworks, has been shut down by the FBI. Approximately $3.6 million in Bitcoin currency was seized in conjunction with the shutdown. [The Washington Post]

Today’s must-read: Randy Kennedy’s report on Detroit, and the looming possibility of the sale of DIA’s art collection. Kennedy gives readers a very clear sense of the damage that would be done to the institution should the City attempt to do this; basically, it would be destroyed. [The New York Times]

Chicago art dealer Alan Kass was convicted of fraud. Due to health issues, he was sentenced to six months in prison, followed by six months home confinement, in addition to paying $350,000 in restitution to the gallery’s former clients. [The Art Market Monitor]

Cities unfriendly to artists based on soaring housing prices: Washington, San Diego and Los Angeles. The chart also maps cities where housing costs have declined. Looks like Chicago is a winner here, behind the obvious city, Detroit. [The Washington Post]

Sometimes art and horses don’t mix. Teenage girl buys horse named Señor Pablo Picasso. Finding that a dopey name, she fields suggestions for new names on a message board. Once “Guernica” gets tabled, the infighting begins. [The Chronicle of the Horse]

You’ve got a month to enter the 2013 Conscientious portfolio competition. Aimed at emerging photographers, it’s free to submit, and all you have to do is send a link to your website and tell them what pictures to consider. Deadline is Halloween. [Conscientious]

On Wednesday, Sotheby’s largest shareholder Dan Loeb, fired off a letter to the auction house accusing CEO William Ruprecht of failing to offer up “enough modern masterpieces to woo potential bidders and compete with rival Christie’s International.” That same day, Sotheby’s announced the upcoming sale of two major modern works by Picasso and Giacometti, worth a combined $80 million. [The Wall Street Journal]

Last night, UbuWeb announced artist Walter De Maria’s passing over Twitter. The Los Angeles Times followed up with a pleasant write up on the “artist and sometime musician”, who might be best remembered for Lightning Fields. [UbuWeb, Los Angeles Times]

SVA will begin offering a Master’s in Curatorial Studies. [Art in America]

Walter Robinson wonders whether there’s a correlation between a surplus of artists and skyrocketing auction prices. His conclusion: professionalization and market interest means the art world’s become successful in the eyes of more than a handful of avant-garde types. It means we’ve become pretty “ordinary”. [Artspace]

Monya Rowe will be leaving Chelsea for a cozy, Lower East Side spot on 34 Orchard street. [Bedford + Bowery]

Culture Coin seeks to be the BitCoin for artists, and then some. We’re not sure exactly how this alternative currency will work; it seeks to “compensate artists for their sweat equity.” An okay idea, sure.[Shareable]

What do Lorna Mills, Glasspopcorn, Nick Briz, and Olia Lialina have in common? If you ask me, and most others, not much, other than dealing with art and “art” online. Jennifer Chan, in “Community Without Community: Net Art and its Micro-spheres”, her new article for West Space Journal, asks these four people about how community informs the type of work they make online. Unsurprisingly, none of them have much in common. [West Space Journal]

The Foundation for Contemporary Arts announces its 2013 grants to organizations. Here’s the full list. [Artforum]